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Wednesday, April 6, 2016

Much of my genealogy lately has revolved around my DNA matches. Sometimes, though, I need a break. That's when I head back to traditional research. And I freely admit, most of my traditional research comes via the internet.

I have many of my lines researched 200 years or more back in time. But no matter how much information I have, I always want more. Always! I also review some of those "dormant" families and see what might be new, or new to me, on the interwebs. One method is through online digitized books. It is pretty amazing how many old family genealogies and town histories have been digitized. Searching Google Books and the Hathi Trust usually yields something good.

Take the case of my search on the TENNY or TENNEY family of New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. There is a Tenney family history book I've located that mentions my great-great-great-grandmother Amelia Tenney (1838-1891). I have confirmed using other sources that this is indeed my family. The Tenney book goes back several generations, to Thomas Tenney (c1615-1699) of Yorkshire, England and Rowley, Massachusetts, and includes descendants and many in-laws when known.

A little farther along Amelia Tenney's direct line, I came across Lucretia CLEVELAND. Hmm. There can't be too many Cleveland families in the 1700's. Some web searching about President Grover Cleveland yields his line and ancestry - and it ends the same as mine! Our first common American ancestor is Moses Cleveland, who came to Massachusetts in 1634 from Suffolk County, England. Another of Moses' descendants, also called Moses but using the spelling Cleaveland, was a famous surveyor and the founder of...Cleveland!

Here is each of our lines:

Using this chart from ISOGG, I traced each of our paths to Moses Cleveland. Moses was Grover's 4th great-grandfather and he is my 10th great-grandfather. That makes Grover and me 5th cousins 6 times removed, or 5C6R.

I can call him Grover because he is my cousin after all ;)

For a Midwestern girl who comes from farmers and miners, I'm not quibbling about the degree of cousinship. I'm related to a President!

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Photograph: The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. "Grover Cleveland and his Cabinet." The New York Public Library Digital Collections. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47de-86d5-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99